But perhaps Weingarten’s most valuable contribution is alerting the underinformed among us that the little, squeezed-off, oft-anthropomorphized glob of toothpaste — of the type featured in the AquaFresh logo — has a proper name.

And, of course, wherever there is a trademarkable glob of toothpaste, there must also be a lawsuit over who owns that trademark, as detailed in this Reuters article on the epic Colgate-Palmolive versus GlaxoSmithKline nurdle war. To wit: “In a 76-page complaint filed against Glaxo in Manhattan federal court, Colgate said it recently launched in the United States a toothpaste whose packaging superimposes the words ‘Triple Action’ — suggesting cavity protection, fresh breath and whiter teeth — on a blue, white and green ‘nurdle,’ the wave-shaped toothpaste blob that sits on a toothbrush head.”

Or, to paraphrase: Hey Glaxo — get your dirty hands off our nurdle.

Now, it’s quite possible that Romney, when approving his red-white-and-blue-swirled “R,” did not realize he was stepping into a sordid world of contention, enmity, bitterness, whiter teeth and minty fresh breath. But intentions aside, that’s exactly what he’s done. He has stepped right into a fresh nurdle.

Bruce Grierson wrote this week’s cover story about Ellen Langer, a Harvard psychologist who has conducted experiments that involve manipulating environments to turn back subjects’ perceptions of their own age.Read more…